Pearl & Ash

Pearl and Ash offers delicious, playful dishes in a relaxed yet upscale and trendy setting. We came in without a reservation (after ditching our original dinner plans) and sat at the bar to wait for a table.
The bartender was not at all attentive, but the sommelier was wonderful and helped us pick out a lovely white burgundy. Our server once we were seated was a lot better, but still lacked a little professionalism. Anyhow, onto the meal, which was delectable. From favorite to least favorite, here’s what we ordered:
Rabbit Sausage
This was the most delicious thing I ate all night. The sausage was so tender I had to interrupt my date to tell him how amazing it was. It was also really well seasoned, and went to well with the charred spring onion soubise, which brought a nice sweetness and intrigue to the salty sausage slices.
Burgundy Escargot Ragout
This was also exceptionally delicious. The sauce it came in was garlicky and full of basil, and was seriously addictive. My only regret is that it didn’t come with even a single slice of baguette, and the bread on the menu is too flavorful to serve as a sauce-​sopper for this dish.
Six Day Brisket
This dish was tasty, and the brisket was wonderfully melt-​apart tender.
Veal Tartar
This dish gives me mixed feelings. While the veal was a little tough and lacked the fat to give it a nice tartar texture (maybe an egg or some other fat could have helped), I loved the flavor combinations on the plate, and when you combine the sardines, cheese chip (yes, cheese chip) and sauce, you get a lovely bite.
Spanish Octopus
Let me start by saying the tiny potatoes on the plate were outstanding. However, the octopus was definitely overcooked and a bit dry.
We also ordered the bread, which is full of fennel seed and comes out warm. The dishes were brought out a few at a time, which was nice, and service was overall okay. Since we were literally the last patrons in the restaurant, we were not offered a dessert menu, so I guess we have to wait until next time to try those out.
Overall, I’d be back to try more of the fun, whimsical combinations and because the ambience is lovely and very date-​friendly.

The old adage, «don’t say anything unless you have something good to say» does not apply, here.
I walked in very close to a crowd of young Caucasian women and the host thought I was with their party. When the host found out I was with my own party, the experience began to be very poor.
Immediately, she (the host) told my party and me all tables were reserved. She, however, allowed my party to sit at the bar. The service was slow and unwelcoming. The staff did not disclose the happy hour to us until around 6:17 p.m. and the happy hour ended at 6:30 p.m.
Two hours later, the majority of tables were still empty. When I say majority, I explicitly mean the place was nearly empty. On top of lack luster alcoholic snow cones (with no alcohol), the host and servers lacked personality (except Richard).
Please do better, Pearl and Ash.
A concerned tourist.

Pretty disappointed by the food here. For the price point I expected every dish to be amazing. My friend and I couldn’t even finish the sweetbreads or sea urchin appetizer because we really didn’t like them. The Branzino was pretty dry and was nothing to write home about. We did however like the brisket and the cheesecake that followed.
Waitstaff and ambience were both nice but I really prefer Rebelle’s food which is right next door.

Incredibly overpriced. Left hungry. We were greeted by the waiter informing us that we should order «3 plates per person» which are on average $ 24 because it was a «sharing» restaurant. We told him we preferred to have our own individual plates but the food still arrived one plate at a time so we got to watch each member of our party eat their individual plate.
The waiter continually tried to up sell us on absolutely everything and his recommendations seemed based on what had the highest price point.
We paid $ 150 for 4 tiny plates of mediocre food. How is this trendy?

Highly skilled staff and challenging small plates … with an unusual and quirky drink list, loved it!
You put together a meal — 5 or 6 plates for two … we started with a fluke crudo w/​pickled rhubarb and moved on to charred rapini and fiddleheads and ramps … then cavatelli and brisket and finished a cheese platter … it was a spectacular assortment … the wines by the glass were varied … a wonderful evening.
What I especially enjoyed was the knowledgeable staff … answered every query with enthusiasm … a fine evening.

This review is just for the Sunday fried chicken dinner.
The salad and sides are very good (although the salad was a little over-​dressed.) Greens had a nice kick to them. Grits were tasty and creamy.
The chicken… should have been the star of the show, but it lacked flavor and crunch and was on the fatty side. It was also a little undercooked, which I know freaks a lot of people out. I would also think that you would get more than 2 pieces/​person for $ 30.
I had a cocktail, too – which is a little misleading. The «cocktails» are very light (at least the one that I had) – think spritzer.
The restaurant itself has a nice vibe. I might go again to try some regular menu items, but I really can’t recommend the fried chicken.

I love this spot. Truly.
The atmosphere is cozy, rustic tables, soft ambience, great service.
However, it is their wine list that keeps me coming back. Their sommelier here does an amazing curation of bottles and that alone is enough to get me here.
Yet, their shareable dishes have always been delicious and I have never ordered anything I didn’t like here.
BUT come here for the wine!

Oh what great oysters and wine. I need to come back here for more for a more lengthy review!

Expensive but good food.
Ran out of our specialty cocktails.
Cool concept and nice menu.

A great, trendy yet accessible dinner spot.
Here are the reasons I give it 5 stars:
They have a separate menu for those with food allergies or intolerances (gluten free, soy free, nightshade free, ect). They really care about making your dining experience enjoyable.
Another great think is their wine list. Now we were looking for bottles, so I can’t comment on their wines by the glass selection.
Finally, the food was lovely. I agree with some that it isn’t «adventurous» however it is still inventive and delicious. Small plates means you can try even more as well!
Overall, would return here again!

Enjoyed a delicious meal here this past weekend. We shared the baby artichokes, the Spanish octopus, the cod, and the pork belly, all of which were delicious. We finished with the brownie for dessert and enjoyed a wonderful chateauneuf du pape chosen from the extensive wine list. Service was warm and attentive. Décor was eclectic and fun.

I was on my way to ramen after spending a some time at the New Museum, when I stumbled upon Pearl & Ash. I sat at the bar and ordered a glass of wine and a few small plates. Everything was delicious, but the scallops were my favorite. I’m not sure why others have about the portion sizes/​prices. The food was adequately priced for the quality and the portion sizes are similar to other small plates places in San Francisco, Chicago, and New York. Small plates are more in keeping with the European way of dining… try a little of this a little of that and it’s great if you’re not that hungry or you don’t want to commit to one dish.

This cutely decorated place on the Bowery serves delicious small plates — comparable to Stanton Social, but fancier. All of their plates are good, and some are absolutely phenomenal. It’s great to come with a few people who will share food. You can order fish/​meat in entrée sizes as well.
They have an extensive wine program. Their cocktail list is uniquely liqueur/​bitters/​sherry based, and are mixed perfectly. My ginger/​amaretto cocktail was A+. Everyone at our table liked theirs.
HIGHLIGHTS:
Sweetbread (ground head and throat meat), octopus, tuna, and the brisket (!!!). These were *particularly* delicious in ways that I remember them days after the meal.
Also tasty: chicken liver & foie gras, head cheese, market carrots, and the scallops. Everything is good and you can’t go wrong.
Great for date night, dinner with friends… really, good for all situations.

My experience at Pearl & Ash was very disappointing.
The food: the small plates are very small and overpriced given that nothing we tried was that good. When serving tiny servings at such expensive prices, I would expect to be impressed but sadly, Pearl & Ash just doesn’t deliver.
The service: service was incredibly inattentive! They never even asked us if we wanted drinks. Dishes were brought out haphazardly at random intervals and no one ever checked in to see how we were doing.
The ambiance: the restaurant is beautiful and has great date night ambiance, if you’re willing to overlook so-​so food and bad service.

The service at this place was very nice and the bottled beers/​ales were good.
However, I have a huge gripe with this place because of their **insanely small portion sizes** and I’m completely baffled by how they highlighted these microscopic sizes by serving several dishes on only ¹⁄₃ of the entire plate.
Don’t be fooled by the $ 10 – 15 pricing on their dishes. Unless you have hundreds to spend on a single meal and want to order the entire menu for yourself, I doubt anyone would be satisfied with the amount of sustenance provided.
I (wrongly) assumed that my friend and I would have some nice tapas and be able to share 4 – 5 dishes between us, but we were left in near starvation after finishing just 3 dishes that we had to have a second dinner in Chinatown that literally cost half as much, with 5 times the amount of food (not joking).
A review of specific items ordered:
— «scallops, avocado, chicharron» ($ 13): Literally, this dish looked like they took one single scallop and chopped it into 5 dime-​sized pieces, while smearing a few teensy squeezes of green sauce (I can only take their word that it was avocado sauce, as there was barely any for me to taste!) and adding one crumpled chicharron scattered about. This was one dish that was plated in a crescent-​moon shape on a plate that was 75% empty. Why?
— «skate, brown butter, chimichurri» ($ 15): Two pieces of skatefish that were the size of dollar coins, over 3 halved gumball-​sized potatoes. While the skatefish was nice and crispy, there was an insane amount of salt on it (and I’m usually a fan of salty food) that made me inclined to brush my fork repeatedly over the sauce to balance the saltiness.
— «lamb belly, radish, harissa-​yogurt» ($ 16): Another menu item that they felt appropriate to plate on only ¹⁄₃ of the dish! Literally, I could have fit all of the lamb belly on half of my iPhone 4 screen. There was such a minute amount that they probably cut 30 portions off a single notebook-​sized piece of meat. All I can really remember was a fatty clump of meat creating a salty pool of grease in my mouth that seemed to never leave.
We started off with only these dishes (and mind you, our waitress tried to get us to order everything at once– even though they served these dishes one at a time– probably to get us to commit to a huge order early on).
Originally, we were planning to have more, but after trying these infinitesimal portions, we decided to go somewhere with actual substantive food instead.
In order to make sure that we were at least not going to starve on our way to the next restaurant, we also ordered the bread with chicken butter and maple syrup ($ 5), which was fine– but nothing too special and quite honestly, should have been served to all patrons for free.
I wish I could have evaluated the place more on the taste of the food, but there was seriously so little that I couldn’t get a good feel for the general flavors or density of the items.
And I have to ask again «why would they present their dishes such that the majority of the plate is empty and the lack of food glaringly obvious???»
With two drinks, we literally spent $ 80+ on something less than an appetizer!
The nice waitstaff is the only reason I’m giving this place 2 stars instead of 1.
I personally don’t recommend this place and will never return.
Complete and utter waste of money…

IN SHORT: Despite a menu that feels more formulaic than fantastic, Pearl & Ash is still a showcase for many of chef Richard Kuo’s technical talents. With a wine list longer and more affordable than most in the city, everyone from friends in a big group to couples on an early, intimate dinner date can find at least one thing they like about the restaurant.
THE STORY: There is something to be said for identifying a winning formula with empirical evidence of success and just running with it. After all, that’s what so many great businesses are founded on. I once worked for a company of public space redevelopment consultants that dramatically reinvigorated parks and open spaces across the country using the simple practices the firm first developed at Bryant Park in New York. Yet there is a difference between applying the Bryant Park method of vibrant placemaking to public spaces in other cities and applying the same compositional formula to an entire meal. And at Pearl & Ash, while the formula is clear, its uniform execution across the menu has resulted in a do-​it-​yourself tasting menu that is at times wearisome and difficult to finish.
One of my most knowledgable food and wine friends and I were just two dishes into our meal when we first noticed this jarring sense of repetition in flavor and texture. Because the menu is organized into six categories (Raw, Small, Fish, Meat, Vegetables, Sugar) of small plates designed for sharing (an unbearable phrase whose syntax I won’t spend time critiquing yet), we had three squeezed onto our table all at once. Besides making us feel like we were being rushed out of our table just moments after we had sat down and causing us to fear that one of our dishes would run cold if we did not finish it with lightspeed fervor, the arrangement of plates let us realize just how similar each dish actually was.
The raw salmon with asparagus and a thick, creamy hollaindaise sauce so closely mirrored the flavor and texture profile of the hamachi with crunchy jicama and a rich, creamy swath of ricotta that we couldn’t appreciate either dish for itself. There was a heavy hand that applied these creamy elements, too, and the delicate flavor of the lovely pieces of hamachi was unfortunately almost intelligible.
The octopus, probably the most popular plate on the menu, also sits on an off-​putting amount of thick sunflower seed purée. The octopus itself, however, covered with a crunchy and spicy flash seared togarashi powder is perfectly tender.
It’s regrettable then, that nearly every dish on the menu can be broken down like this into a feature protein or vegetable, a bit of crunch, and a thick, creamy, sauce-​like component, because there is a lot of strength in many of the precise flavor combinations of these high-​qualtiy ingredients. But taken together, the wow-​factor is muddled, and the menu feels of a formulaic attitude with too little creativity.
This sensation made the dry pork meatballs with shiitake, bonito, and soppressata and the potatoes with an overwhelming dose of mayo with barely detectable porcini mushrooms and just a sparse speckle of chorizo less than enjoyable to finish. The meaty bavette, another favorite on the menu, can also be found on top of a cauliflower purée that too closely imitates the purée that rests under the octopus. The meal of small dishes put together by the diner then ends with a sigh of relief rather than a wistful longing for more.
What I haven’t discussed yet is the wine, which is Pearl & Ash’s strongest, and most progressive feature. In order to truly enjoy the restaurant in the future, one’s best bet is to take time exploring the never-​ending and phenomenally well-​priced wine list, enjoy a bottle or two with a date, and perhaps nibble on a plate here and there when hunger strikes. In this way, Pearl & Ash will feel a little less like the tired result of a systematic approach to cooking and more like the brilliant, forward-​thinking restaurant and bar it tries to be.

Dining at Pearl & Ash was easily one of the best restaurant experiences I’ve had in recent memory. I met a couple of friends here on a Tuesday night for oyster happy hour– $ 1 oysters until 6:30, and we ended up staying well past that. Started with a delicious bottle of white wine from the Loire Valley that was recommended by the bartender/​sommelier, and continued on to a delicious California Pinot noir that worked well with the wide variety of dishes we ordered. The wine list here is definitely the main draw, extensive and underpriced, but the food is also exceptional. Bold flavors and fresh ingredients served by a casual but professional staff in a lively and youthful environment. I regret not having checked this place out sooner and I look forward to returning to Pearl & Ash regularly.

I came here with my daughter on one of her last nights in NYC. We took the waiters advice and ordered quite a few small plates. Everything was absolutely amazing.
We started with the heirloom tomatoes, raw sirloin and hamachi. Next was the bread service with chicken butter, pork meatballs, octopus.
Our next course was the andouille, potatoes bravas and short rib.
The dessert stole the show with the vanilla bean and apricot dish and also the chocolate marshmallow graham cones.
The service was impeccable and so was the wine! Truly a 5 star experience. Loved the atmosphere as well.
The couple next to us ordered the $ 18 brownie bourbon pecan. It was massive and smell delicious!

3.5 stars, not 3.0.
The hostess was fantastic. I showed up at 9pm on a Saturday night without a reservation and the hostess not only immediately put me on the waitlist (I was the first one) but as I was hanging out in the entryway for my husband, a spot at the bar opened up and she immediately pointed it out to me. She was really nice and certainly paid attention to me.
The stools at the bar are really awkward. They’re basically just solid rectangles of wood which are really awkward to physically slide.
The bartender was good; I enjoyed talking to him for a bit before my husband showed up. Even after my husband showed up the bartender was attentive and fun to chat with.
The wine list is extensive but unfortunately it’s weighed heavily toward bottles. Their menu for single glasses of wine isn’t very big at all, but what they do have for single glasses is good and some wines quite unique (a wine from New Mexico? Interesting!) We only had two of the items from the dinner menu — the potatoes and the arctic char — both were very good.
I probably won’t be back because it’s a bit out of the way from where I normally hang out but overall I liked Pearl & Ash.

Went on a Sunday night for Dinner at Pearl & Ash, so while the restaurant was full the atmosphere was relaxing and calm. We loved the décor (not stuffy or uptight at all) and the service was excellent. Nice wine options although essentially nothing under $ 13 for a glass (most were between 14 – 17) so pricey for sure.
For two people, we shared five tapas and two desserts. Just the right amount of food; we left full but not disgustingly stuffed or dying to go horizontal.
The highlights of the dishes were the scallops and duck. Excellent flavors and quite unique ingredients. The presentation was exceptional. The potatoes with mushroom mayo were delicious too but very rich. The octopus was also good but not my favorite I’ve ever tasted and the raw hamachi was the least exciting.
Dessert was fun. We had the trio of donuts (Apple bacon, blood orange, and chocolate stout) and a negroni ice cream sandwich. I had no idea what to expect from the ice cream but it was spot on with the flavor of campari. Yum! An absolutely enjoyable meal although expensive for sure so be prepared to leave with significantly less money than when you arrived!